Undo etiquette in games

While playing a game. The opponent made a move in the bottom left corner (a poor one) and requested an undo. They then made a move in the middle of the board, nowhere near their original one.

Is it considered rude to do this?

“I made a bad move, undo please”

When I accept an undo, I expect them to play in the same area, either because of a misclick or misreading. It annoyed me when this person played somewhere completely different, after I let them undo their bad move.

So for etiquette. Say you did misclick and request an undo. You spot a move somewhere else which is better. Would you play where you originally intended, or the better move?

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Your opponent was rude, no question.

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Well, now I guess there IS a question. It’s pretty easy to play a wildly wrong move on an iphone.

It also depends on your personal preferences. I usually grant my opponents at least 1 undo per game. I usually like when my opponent finds a better move to make the game more interesting.

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If you were playing a friend in real life, and they asked to play again, I doubt you’d be so annoyed.

Unless the game was incredibly important to you (like you’re gunning for the #1 spot in a ladder), I wouldn’t worry about it. It’s easy to be annoyed with people on the other side of a computer screen.

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I’m all with @Franzisa and @pathogenix here.

And now, folks, how do you handle this in a tournament?

Greetings, Tom

I think undo requests were more reasonable before the undo button is adjusted. Back then, one player could misclick either because of mistaking the button as the “Submit” button, or because the game somehow does not require a “Submit” click after each move and the player is already accustomed to clicking “Submit.”

Now this issue has been resolved because the “Undo” button is deliberately shifted to the left of the panel, so a lot of misclicks are avoided.

Cases do exist when the player clicks on a mobile device/tablet, because the clicks have a higher chance of “shifting.” In that case, it is reasonable to explain to your opponent, “Sorry, I misclicked it because I was playing on my phone”, for example. Your opponent WILL understand you as I believe the players on OGS have a high understanding of courtesy and etiquette. However, if you just play an unsatisfactory move, it is against the ethics of Go to undo and you should not ask for an undo. As the traditional Chinese saying goes, “落子无悔” (Never regret a stone after it’s placed.)

Sidenote: @matburt I think maybe we can have some sort of misclick detection: 1) on mobile devices, place a move only if the point is long-clicked (currently it is a short-click listening, so I have to “aim” for the point when I am on a phone;) 2) On a computer, set a visual+audio warning when a short-click happens on the board. (This kind of sounds like what they do at KGS, though…This need not be built if the “Submit” button applies on all games.)

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Hi xhu98!

We already have a sort of misclick detection. You can enable double-click moves or confirmation-mode for moves in your profile. :smiley:

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Yeah, if you use a touchscreen device, you should never use the single or double-click move, and set you preferences to submit button.
Maybe the mobile site should be made so it’s not possible to use any setting other than submit button.

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